Incongruous North-of-England/Middle-Eastern News Juxtapositions of the Day

Ant and Dec Attacked By The Taliban:

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2008/09/28/ant-and-dec-attacked-by-the-taliban-in-afghanistan-115875-20758844/


Pentland Firth has some of the strongest currents in the world; it's often described as 'the potential Saudi Arabia of marine power':

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/7641460.stm


Have you found an incongruous north-of-England/Middle-Eastern news juxtaposition? If so email the link to richarddedomenici@hotmail.com

Operation Enduring-Contraflow

The clear blue morning of September the 27th 2008 will go down in history among the people of London as a day of ignominy:

























As the day that the Aldgate Roundabout was destroyed.


















































No organisation has yet to claim responsibility for the atrocity, although speculation surrounding cctv pictures of a white van continues.


























Shell-shocked members of the public stand around in a state of bewilderment.

“Whoever did this to our roundabout, replacing it with a sensible system of pedestrian crossings and two-way streets, should be brought to swift justice” said one emotional first-responder.

“Where’s the No.25 Bus Stop gone?” said an equally outraged woman.



























Claims that remaining dust could be hazardous have been denied by authorities.




















Other prominent roundabouts across the nation, including the Watford Ring-Road (above), have been placed on high alert.




















Only a crater remains where, until yesterday, heavy traffic flowed.


























Already an impromptu memorial has been established at the site.


























A steady stream of pedestrians arrive to pay their respects, many spraying tributes to the roundabout in Braille on the pavement.





























“Never Again” reads this anonymous message.


























It is hoped that that, from these shattered remains, a new Aldgate Roundabout can, one day, be rebuilt.

Shouting at the Television

I just watched Ricky Gervais being interviewed on the Daily Show, and couldn't help but notice that he almost immediately reverted to the script of his 2003 show 'Animals'.

For example he informed John Stewart that:

"Bats always exit a cave to the left"

to which Stewart remarked:

"We should try that in the subway"

At this point Gervais could, if he had wanted to be topical and provocative, have retorted:

"You should try that in Iraq"

Instead he replied:

"Yeah, all exit left.. even if it's not the way you want to go.. there'd be less bumping in.."


Later he challenged:

"Ask me anything about sharks and Nazis"

To which Stewart enquired:

"What direction do Nazis move, when they walk out of a .."

Ricky quickly interjected:

"Polar bears are left-handed"


Which is all well and good, but surely instead of this, he should have pointed his arm in the air, palm stretched, and shouted:

"They go Reich!"




No?

Too soon?


Well anyway, my point is, we all have creative peaks and troughs, and if we're lucky we'll be offered lucrative Hollywood contracts to see us through the wilderness years.

Decide for yourself here.

Notorious AIG

Radio 4 has just posited that capitalism has failed.

I propose a brief period of anarchy followed by a new era of social production for social consumption.

Rock Me Amadeus

Logo Test

ArtsBlog

Image by Cool Text: Logo and Button Generator - Create Your Own

I thought this man was doing a wee

but actually he was just taking a photograph of a flower.

Sorry, man.

Frogfish!

Lesson's Motmot

Why won't you kiss me, smiling goat?

Trying to kiss a goat

Institutionalised Dyslexia

I momentarily thought this said 'Swap Latinos for Filipinos'.

Dragon's Den: Aching to Spend

I realise that Dragon's Den is in its sixth series, and probably struggling to maintain audience share, but nevertheless I think this promotional image is a step too far:
















(UPDATE: Some penis-dyslexic viewers have failed to notice that they all have their cocks out.)

Eurobeat!

As you may have already surmised from my slapdash liveblogging, a couple of days ago seven of us went to the opening night of Eurobeat - The Eurovision Musical, at the Novello Theatre in Aldwych.

It was written and devised by my friend Craig Christie, who I met on a boat
























during a conference in Toronto in 2005.

We quickly became friends after he told me he was writing a musical about the Eurovision Song Contest.

Here is Craig's Eurovision 2007 Post-Match Analysis from Luci's balcony:



Anyway, we all had a marvelous time at Eurobeat and, so long as you've seen Eurovision before, you're sure to have a marvelous time too.

Especially if you've ever been to a Eurovision Fancy Dress Party:



Or a Eurovision Preview with Patrick O'Connell:




I think I've said too much.


(Eurobeat runs for the next ten weeks!)

Uncanny

In further attempts to transform this blog into a popular tech site, here is my impression of Zeno the robot boy:



And here's my impression:


(Click here if not working)

I will make a longer version if requested.

Latest Apple News

Richard DeDomenici is high on fumes having just coloured his headphones black with a magic marker.


















Now he can listen to Crazy Frog on the bus.

Self-Inflated/Extracting the Michael

When preparing oneself for an audacious anarcho-surrealist street performance, it's important to do the appropriate warm-up exercises:



Seamless.

How do you like them Apples?

My recent post about Apple masssively boosted traffic to DeDomenici Blog.

As such, in a cynical move to increase visitors, I'll be writing another one shortly.

ConCERNs Over Taste and Decency

To celebrate the successful switch-on of the Large Hadron Collider, here is picture of arch-satirist Chris Morris standing in front of it:






















And here is an interesting podcast of a conversation between Morris and Scientist Brian Cox.

There's also one with Kevin Eldon and Simon Munnery.

All of which make me suspect that the LHC is nothing but a bewilderingly flamboyant viral marketing campaign for an as-yet unannounced late-night BBC2 comedy series.




PS. It is my ambition in life to reach a level of notoriety whereby I am invited for a tour of the Large Hadron Collider.

PPS: Even though this is likely the incoherent ramblings of a madman, it fills me with hope and joy.

Bestival

Headlining: Genesis

It Just Works

I've just been testing the new 'Genius' feature in iTunes 8, which suggests songs you might like based on the music in your library. The first few times I played something it replied:








Which I have chosen to interpret as meaning that I have eclectic musical tastes.


Later, I played 'Technologic' by Daft Punk, and it suggested the following:















I have subsequently switched off Genius functionality.

Extracting the Michel

Below is Michel Gondry's music video for 'Star Guitar' by the Chemical Brothers'. The source footage was shot by Gondry from a train window between Avignon and Nimes.

I have carefully spliced six seconds of footage from my recent train trip from Paris to Barcelona into the video. See if you can spot it:



More Barcelona stuff soon.

Apologies Iran.

Maybe I shouldn't have been so incredulous. This is from Micheal Heseltine's autobiography:

"In October 1972 Iran Air signed a preliminary agreement to purchase two Concordes for delivery in late 1976 or early 1977 with an option on a third. Six and a half years later the Shah was deposed and for at least two years before that he came under increasing anti-modernisation political pressure."

The Iranian revolution took place in 1979, and Iran Air officially canceled their order in April 1980, the last airline to do so.


The Iran Air office was open today, so I went in and got some better pictures:


Turns out that, due to sanctions imposed by the United States government, Iran Air can only purchase US-made aircraft which are at least 7 years old, and they only can be purchased through a third party rather than directly from Boeing.

Also, the quantity of US-made parts means that it not possible for Iran Air to purchase aircraft directly from Airbus.

Therefore Iran procure a lot of their planes from Russian manufacturer Tupolev, who in the 60's developed their own Concorde clone, the TU-144 - colloquially known as Concordski.

Iran Air's offices are right next door to Aeroflot's:


















Indeed I suspect they may even share some 'back-office facilities'.

However, Concordski never sold outside of Russia, mainly due to this crash:

Ban These Sick Cakes

Watering the Garden

Louis and Petey

Vic

New Word of the Day

Mouthswitz (noun)

Def: affliction suffered after drinking Old Rosie Cider, which
inexplicably has the aroma of burning hair, vomit and burning bones.

Usage: "No, I can't kiss you; you've got Mouthswitz"